The QuantiFERON-TB Gold In-Tube method (QFT-GIT; Cellestis, Carnegie, Australia) is a recently US Food and Drug Administration-approved interferon-gamma release assay (IGRA) for the detection of tuberculosis infection, which has been screened for by the tuberculin skin test (TST) for nearly a century. We report a pilot study comparing the QFT-GIT and TST results for screening health care workers (HCWs) at Berkshire Medical Center (BMC; Pittsfield, MA), the second hospital in Massachusetts to use QFT-GIT. For the study, 40 BMC HCWs, 20 TST+ and 20 TST-, were screened with the QFT-GIT test. All 20 TST- subjects were also QFT-GIT-, while only 10 of 20 TST+ subjects were QFT-GIT+. The overall agreement between the QFT-GIT and TST results was 75% (kappa = 0.5; 95% confidence interval, 0.268-0.732). The suboptimal agreement was partially due to a higher specificity of QFT-GIT. Confounding factors (eg, bacille Calmette-Guérin vaccination status and birthplace) are discussed, and literature regarding IGRAs and their comparison with TST is reviewed.
-A framework for bone marrow synoptic reporting will improve completeness of the final report in a manner that is clear, succinct, and consistent among institutions.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.